Portal: Chell's Story
by discoball667
Summary: Chell wants her parents. Gordon Freeman wants vindication. What will happen when both of their worlds collapse, and their lives collide?
1. Chapter 1

_Author Note:_

_This is a new story that I am starting. I really hope you like it! I am passionately entranced with the video game Portal 2, and thought that I would start a story centered on it for my first story! I hope you all like it! Please review and give me suggestions! :D_

Chell turned the corner, her legs pumping tirelessly beneath her. Her portal gun hummed in her hands, waiting for her finger to pull the trigger and send a portal beam whizzing towards its target. There was minimal light in the passages between the test chambers, and Chell had to occasionally put out her hand to find a wall when she could no longer see where she was going. Chell stopped her tireless run down the black corridor to catch her breath. There would be another test chamber ahead of her, she knew.

And another beyond that.

And another beyond that.

Suddenly, there was a voice coaxing her on towards the chamber ahead of her, a deep reassuring male voice that she had come to hate over the course of her training. When she had signed the papers that ensured that Aperture Science had no legal holding over what happened to her, she didn't know what she was getting into. After the dotted line had been filled with her signature, a man in a white suit had stepped out of the door to her right and motioned her to follow him. There had been no mention of what exactly she was going to be testing, and how long her stay would be for. She had started to regret her decision to become a test subject the moment that they had fastened the Long Fall Boots to her shins.

Chell hastened down the hallway, stopping only to gaze at the locked door at the end of the passage. The lock had a symbol that portrayed a stick figure running. The symbol had always been a foreboding sight for Chell, telling her that her nightmare was not over. The door unlocked, the little man swirling around, and slid open with a click. The voice prodded her on with words of encouragement.

Chell stepped out of the door, it closing and locking behind her, and gazed out at her newest hurtle. There was an Excursion Funnel humming away in the center of the room, pressing one of the many weighted companion cubes to the ceiling. There was a moat of what Chell described in her head as bile. Behind the funnel there was a slick of blue jell snaking its way towards the wall on the opposite side. This one was really a no brainer, and that put Chell on edge. The only reason that there would be an easy test is because it was a mind trick, or because Aperture Science was training a new rookie in the designing of test chambers. Chell chose the latter as the reason for its simplicity, and continued to solve the puzzle that it had presented her.

The reason that Chell had come to Aperture Science in the first place, is because she had always wanted to find her parents. She had been searching for them ever since she had turned 21. At that point, there had been a plethora of money to back her efforts, but after a length of time, that stash had run dry. Chell had realized that if she would want to continue her ventures, she absolutely had to get some sort of income. Aperture had been the first thing to jump into her mind. Earlier in the week, she had seen an advertisement for test subjects in the vast underground labs of Aperture Science. Chell had jumped at the chance to become one of the lucky few that where going to be chosen for the job. Too late had she realized that the apparent God send was really just a coy into free test subjects.

Chell vaulted over the lake of bile that was keeping her from the exit door. As she closed the distance to the door, it slid open and let her pass into the ending chamber. Instead of a long hallway leading to another chamber, there was an elevator. _Oh thank goodness._ Chell thought.

An elevator present in the ending chamber could only mean one thing: testing was over. She wouldn't be leaving the Aperture Science underground, but she would be able to go to bed.

Bed.

_Had it really been that long?_ Chell wondered.

Chell stepped exhaustedly into the small, glass elevator and let the doors slide shut around her. The elevator gracefully jumped upwards, almost immediately traveling at the speed of any conventional rail train. Outside her encasement, Chell could see almost nothing, but she was sure that just beyond the dull, black metal sheet in front of her there were thousands of machines ready to build any set of complicated test chambers, and deliver her to them. She could hear a far off clanking that softly rattled past the metal barrier, through the cylinder glass doors, and into her ears. Chell would have wondered what could have been making such a ruckus, but she was too tired; exhausted after a long days' worth of jumping around and being flung around.

After a short trip, the elevator stopped at a small, cramped corridor that lead to an equally small, plain door. As they slid open, a ding from the doors prompted her to get out of the elevator, which Chell did so with great joy. Her day was done. Now she could sleep. Just beyond that plain, wooden door in front of her was her bed, calling for her body to curl up inside of its warmth and dream about a better life; a life with her parents.

But Chell just wanted to sleep.

Sleep for a long while.

To never wake up.

Gordon Freeman flipped a page in the folder he was carrying, revealing a picture of a newly built Electron Transistor. His newly built Electron Transistor. He had been begging the Black Mesa Board of Directors to allow the construction of one, seeing that it would be exceedingly helpful to his work if he had one to double check his work. Gordon could not keep his eyes off of the thing. He wanted to have it now, to play around with it and then get some actual work done.

A knock on the door to his office brought him back to reality. "Yes?" He answered, straining his eyes over the top of the manila folder.

A woman with dark brown hair, piercing blue eyes, and dressed in a white coat walked in. Gordon recognized her immediately. "Ah! Dr. Alice Chenevier! Thank you for coming all the way from Paris to talk to me!"

Alice waved her hand in gratitude. "The pleasure is mine, Dr. Freeman. I have always wanted to meet the man that came up with the world changing Time-Warp Theories. If it wasn't for the idiotic security guards here, I would have reached you sooner."

Alice sighed and brought a hand to her head, and then quickly removed it. "Well, I have not flown six thousand kilometers just to exchange pleasantries."

Gordon motioned her over to his desk with a nod. "Quite right, Dr. The reason I could not just call you here, is because of this." Gordon pointed to an equation that spanned the width of the paper that it was on. "This! This is a problem! It is a flaw in my own Time-Warp Theories that you were just talking about. If we are about to release to the public that we have come up with a way to teleport, well we must solve this equation. This simple math could undo everything that the Theories state."

Alice bent forwards, examining the equation. She looked up and gestured to a calculator on the side of Gordon's desk. "May I?"

Gordon gave his assent in a curt nod, and she punched a few numbers into the calculator's blinking face. After a few silent moments, she placed the calculator back on the desk and resumed looking into Gordon's face. Her own wasn't so pleasant. "You flew me out here just to look at an ANOMALY?"

Gordon looked shocked. "Anomaly? My good doctor, this is not just that. I was studying the charts of the mass spectrometer here, and the radiation particles were consistent for over an hour **and** at the same time period for many days afterwards! My theories state that they should be random, and they were not!"

Alice's face softened. "So you are telling me that at the same time each and every day, a consistent amount of radioactive particles from space were being detected? That is impossible! Unless…"

Gordon prodded her on with an inquisitive look. "Unless…? What doctor?"

Alice's head snapped up and she looked into Gordon's eyes. "Do you remember the break in that Black Mesa had a few months ago? Didn't you lose something?"

Gordon nodded. "Yes! We lost my Hand-Held Portal Device! I worked hours trying to…" He trailed off as light began to dawn in his eyes. "We'd better call Aperture Science and see what they are up to."


	2. Chapter 2

After the events of Portal 2 and Half-Life 2: Episode 2–

Chell squinted into the blaring sunlight as she gazed across the great expanse of… what was that? Wheat. That's right, wheat.

She hadn't been out of the underground labyrinth that made up Aperture for more than twenty years. And the world had changed.

Chell tried to remember the day that she had come to apply at the Aperture Science skyscraper in Upper Michigan. She remembered that there had been a very long drive to get to the skyscraper, and an even longer wait to get through security. Now Chell remembered.

But now, what was once a great expanse of concrete and scientist lodgings was now a field of wheat. Or was it barley?

Chell looked back to the shack that she had just entered from. There was a companion cube between her and the door. What had happened back there? The adrenaline that had accompanied her almost demise was still coursing through her veins and her heard was still slamming against her ribs. Chell hopped over the cube and gently put her hand up against the door to the facility. Chell remembered **her**. Even though it was hard to admit, Chell had been saved. Saved by her mortal enemy. Chell almost felt sorry for GLaDOS, and then remembered what all she had done to her. Chell took her hand off of the door and turned back towards the sun.

A gust of wind blew past Chell's face, and she breathed deeply. This air wasn't recycled. It wasn't her "one room full of air". It was real.

Chell still had her portal gun, and was grasping onto it with an iron fist, and when she realized that she was, she unclenched her hand, and dropped the gun. It whirred quietly as it fell with a dull thud. Chell didn't want anything to do with that gun anymore. There wasn't anything that she wanted to bring with her from the infernal place in the ground. Chell wanted to be human again, and not just a numbered test subject.

Chell would have stripped right then and thrown away her clothes, but she remembered her humanity, and stopped to think. Chell sighed. What was she doing? She had no one out there that remembered her. No one that cared. She might as well go back down the elevator and test some more. But no. She would not. She was a fighter, and she had conquered the unconquerable.

She was Chell.

Thirteen miles away, Gordon Freeman tried to sleep. His best friend had just been killed in cold blood, and he probably hadn't seen the Sandman in two days. He would occasionally wake up with a jerk, catching himself before he started screaming in horror; the dreams of headcrabs latching onto his brain and sucking away his humanity. After the fifth time jolting awake, Gordon groaned and sat up. He was in a barren, metal-lined room that was his room. There really wasn't any reason for him to stay in bed if all he was going to do was toss-and-turn the night away and besides, Isaac might need some help.

Gordon quickly dressed in his black jacket and jeans, relieved to not have to put on his Life Suit. He opened the iron door to his room at a creakingly slow pace, and finally was able to wedge himself through the door. As he shut the door, a gust of cold wind passed across to him, and made him shiver. He glanced over to the source of the wind; a blown out window that had been covered in a thick blanket that was now wedged to the side of the window ledge, letting a cold gust break through. Gordon walked over to it and lifted the blanket back into position, while looking out of the broken screen.

Not much had changed since the end of the Combine Occupation of Earth. The Occupation itself had done enough already for there to be any more room for change. People still cowered in their houses, and still kept their fair distance away from the Combine central hubs. Unlike the time before the Day of Invasion, there were no child voices to be heard laughing as their sources played together. The only sound to be heard was the occasional sparking of the various exposed electrical wires that lay in tangles where they fell. Gordon could remember the time when people didn't have to carry guns to kill the occasional headcrab that would manifest themselves in the pockets of rubble that lines all the streets in sight. There was still electricity to be harvested from the generators the Combine had left when fleeing the planet, and there were large arrays of computer systems to be salvaged from the rubble piles, but there were not many who actually knew how to use them anymore.

Gordon sighed and fastened the blanket to the window frame. Inside his heart he knew that he blamed himself for the Combine Invasion, but he wouldn't dare tell anyone this truth. Everyone regarded him as a "hero", but Gordon didn't feel like a hero. All he wanted to do was go back to his lab and conduct experiments like he used to do, but he knew he couldn't.

Gordon turned away from the blanketed window and walked back to the end of the hall where a series of voices and lights were coming out from underneath an iron door similar to his own. Gordon pushed open the door and walked inside, almost colliding with Isaac Kleiner. They quickly got themselves untangled and Isaac stammered out his apologies. Gordon waved them away with a "Doctor…" and a nod. Isaac readjusted his glasses and cleared his throat. "Ah! Gordon! I was just on my way to get you!"

Gordon noted that Isaac was obviously excited about something, and glanced questioningly over at Isaac's partner, Arne Magnusson. Magnusson just shrugged and bit deeper into the bagel that he was smacking on. Gordon turned his attention back onto Isaac, and motioned him to go on. Isaac scuttled over to the array of computers that lined the north wall. "Well, the good doctor and I" he motioned over to Magnusson "have been monitoring a certain spot for quite a while. This certain spot, as you can see here," he adjusted a few knobs on the panel in front of him enlarging a spot on the video on the computer screens "is the entrance to the Aperture Science facility. With the Borealis being a necessity as of late, we took the liberty of 'commandeering' a few of Black Mesa's defunct satellites to be the body of this operation. Today we noticed an anomaly at the site. This anomaly turned out to be a person. A woman, to be exact."

Gordon slowly walked over to the screens and observed the enlarged video that was being played and re-played. It showed a woman being ejected out of the entrance shack and behind her a cube of some sort followed her. Gordon grasped one of the screens that showed the woman's face. Isaac came up beside Gordon and nodded. "Yes, Gordon, yes. That is **her**. That is Chell.


	3. Chapter 3

The night bristled around Chell as she stared into the fire that she had created an hour ago. The long, orange tendrils of the Sun's last attempt to stay in the sky reached over the horizon to the West, and the Moon made a show of dominating the sky by becoming larger than usual. Around Chell and her campfire, the grasshoppers sang their songs along with a chorus of sounds emanating from the large trees nearby. But, Chell was too preoccupied with her own thoughts to notice any of these noises.

Earlier, Chell had danced through the wheat field, and bent down to smell the dirt for the first time in a very long time. She had ran over to the trees and the stream of crystal clear water that flowed through the grove. She had tenderly touched the gruff bark of the trees, and had let her hand dangle into the stream of water, making her skin cold. Chell had been so happy to be out of the anally clean environment of Aperture Science, and to be alive. She had slept for a while, how long she did not know, and she had felt refreshed when she awoke. Afterward, Chell had taken a small bath in the water stream, all the while cleaning her orange and white Aperture Science clothing. The day had been waning by the time she had dressed herself, and she had delegated her time to picking up sticks for firewood. After that, it had only been a matter of using her portal gun's pent up energy to create a small flame, which she immediately fueled with her stockpile of increasingly larger sticks and pinecones. Then she had sat and waited for… something.

Chell had always had a plan: A plan to complete the test, a plan to destroy GLaDOS, and a plan to get out of the hell-hole that had been her life for too long. But the success of her plans had ended with completing the numerous tests. GLaDOS had disarmed her with the whole "Caroline" aspect, and Chell had almost not made it out of Aperture Science. Now that she was out, Chell wanted back in… for some reason.

Now, sitting on a large log in front of her fire, Chell put her head in her hands and sighed. What was with her? Why did she show compassion for a computer that had ruined her life and detained her for only God knows how long? She didn't know.

Chell took her head out of her hands, and tried to find a comfortable place next to the log and her fire where she could rest for the night. Her thoughts drifted to her portal gun. After using it for a fire starter, Chell had placed it in a bird hole that had so conveniently presented itself to Chell when she had needed a place to store the gun. Chell wanted nothing to do with Aperture Science now, but just in case she needed it, Chell didn't want to destroy the gun. Chell would have ripped her Aperture Science uniform off of her body if her human morality and embarrassment had stopped her when she had started to do so.

Staring into the fire now, Chell started to drift off to sleep as the weight of her day made its entrance into her mind. She smiled to herself. It wasn't every day that someone got to go to the Moon. Over to her right, Chell heard a twig snap, and she sat bolt upright. She patrolled the dark with her eyes, only finding more darkness and silence. But Chell knew that something had stepped on a stick; a stick that was very near to her.

Gordon cursed himself. He though he was better at this thing! He had been all the way through Ravenwood without getting killed and had basically destroyed the entire Combine army, and couldn't even avoid stepping of a stupid twig. His ear radio crackled and Alyx Vance's voice intruded into his ears. "Hey! Gordon! Watch where you step!"

Gordon smiled. Alyx was his friend and she was just teasing, but he knew that the tone of seriousness in her voice signaled professionalism and a disposition of "I won't be messed with". Gordon nodded over to Alyx's darkened silhouette, and clenched his Colt Python tighter. Even though he probably wouldn't need it, the Python made his heart race at a slower pace. He hadn't seen Chell for over twenty years, and now she was here, ten feet away. He wanted to reach out and touch her; to hug her and tell her that he would never leave her again. But there would be no promises at this time. There would be no heartfelt apologies. There would just be business.

Gordon took his foot off of the now-broken twig and carefully moved forward. He could see Chell clearly now. She had obviously heard him. Chell looked different in a way that Gordon could not figure out. There were the obvious differences in age and height, but there was a certain… weariness that plagued her face and body that made him angry; angry at himself for leaving her.

Alyx was clearly watching Gordon as he observed Chell, and he looked over to her. "What?"

Alyx just shrugged and silently signaled Gordon to move forward. He steadied his gaze back on Chell once again, and started to notice what she was wearing. It was an orange and white Aperture Science uniform. So she had been pressganged into becoming a test subject. Gordon cursed himself again. He would probably never let himself live that failure down.

Gordon sneaked over to where Alyx was crouched and told her to stay put for a bit, which earned him a weird look from her, but no reply. Gordon carefully sneaked over to a bit of a high ground that allowed him to see what was around Chell. He had to find the thing that everyone thought he was coming for, or his secret would be out about Chell. The portal gun was nowhere to be seen. Where had she put it? Gordon looked over to the silhouette of the metal shed in the distance. He sure hoped that it wasn't down there.

Gordon decided that it was high time for a little bit of action on his part, and no more hiding in the shadows. He had to confront Chell. Gordon motioned over to Alyx to stay put, and stopped crouching. He put away his Python and stepped into the light of the fire. At first, Chell didn't notice him on account of looking past him, but she quickly did a double-take and scooted backwards with a cry of surprise. She scrambled to her feet and then turned to run. But she stopped.

Chell turned back towards Gordon and squinted at him for a moment before her eyes lit up wide. "Dad!" She exclaimed.


	4. Chapter 4

-Chell's Perspective-

Gordon slammed his hand against Chell's mouth. "Shhh!" He hissed.

Chell was confused. Her dad was right here in front of her, and he was acting as if he didn't want to see her. His hand was hurting against her mouth and she struggled under his grasp. He released his hold on her, and Chell spat out the dirt that had been on his gloves. Before she could say anything, Gordon whispered to her, "Chell, I am sorry, but you must pretend to not know me. I'll explain later."

At that moment, a woman that Chell had never seen before stepped out of the woods. She was holding a gun that was pointed straight at Chell's head. "Gordon?" The strange woman questioned. "Is everything ok?"

Gordon stepped back away from Chell and her puzzled expression, nodded. "Yes Alyx. Everything is under control."

Chell noticed that Alyx was giving her a wary stare that fixated her eyes on Chell. "What's going on?" Chell asked.

Alyx gestured over to the shed in the distance with her gun, which was still pointing at Chell. "You come out of there?"

Chell blinked back and forth between Gordon and Alyx before slowly nodding. "Yes I did…" She turned to Gordon. "… what is all this about?"

Neither of them answered her question, but Alyx stepped closer to the fire and squinted around the edge of it. "You bring anything out with you?" She questioned, and then spiked Chell with a glare.

Chell knew what she was driving at. Chell had been hoping that Gordon had come to her to rescue her, and to protect her, but Alyx had just destroyed her hopes. They were really after the Portal Gun, not her. Gordon and Alyx; they both could care less about Chell. _And so,…_ Chell thought to herself. _… I won't tell them where the Portal Gun is. That's the only way that I will live._ "No. I just came out. Why?" Chell answered, returning Alyx's glare.

-Gordon's perspective-

Gordon knew that she was lying. He hadn't raised all the way to adulthood Chell just to be fooled by a simple lie. He was about to tell Alyx this, when he caught a glimmer of something in Chell's eyes. Something that just barely rose to the surface as she glanced away from him: Distrust. It killed him in so many ways.

Gordon longed to hug her, to tell her that he was sorry, to tell her that the real reason for him wanting to come out here was her, not some Portal Gun. But the glimmer was there, and the pain constricted his heart. Gordon kept his mouth shut. He couldn't run to her now, though. He couldn't console her mind and heart; not now at least. Gordon hadn't told anyone about Chell, and there would be uproar if anyone found out.

On the day that the Combine had been unleashed upon Earth, Gordon had scrambled to get out of Black Mesa. His whole motivation to do so was the image of Chell in his mind; the image of her needing him. When he had finally gotten out of the infernal science facility, Gordon had found out that earlier in the day, Chell had gone to Aperture Science to get a job. He hadn't seen her since, but the image of her in his mind's eye was still clear and vivid as the day he had pictured it. He had gone all the way through the nightmare of Ravenwood, and destroyed the Combine with her in his mind, and now that she was alive and well standing in front of him, Gordon was pretending to only want a simple piece of machinery. What was he doing?

_Screw it._ He thought. _Screw all decency. I don't care if the world knows about Chell. I love her, and that is all that matters. _

Gordon turned back to Chell, and was about to hug her, when a shot rang out across the valley. Gordon whipped his head back to Alyx, her gun smoking in her hands. Gordon's eyes followed the path of the gun, and watch in horror as blood started to spill out of Chell's stomach.


	5. Chapter 5

-Chell-

The pistol's shot exploded from the gun and slammed into Chell's abdomen, causing her to stumble backwards a few steps and look down to her bleeding stomach in shocked horror. Chell cupped her hands over the wound and began to scream. No matter how much she tried with her hands, she could not stop the blood flow. The pain came crashing into her mind, causing her to fall to her knees and emit another cry of distress. Chell looked up to Alyx and then to Gordon. His face was shocked and his eyes were as wide as they could be. Gordon's expression changed to anger, and he turned to Alyx with clenched teeth and fists. "What the HELL, Alyx?"

Alyx seemed shocked at his response, and stuttered a bit while lowering her gun to the floor. Gordon rushed to Chell and wrapped his arms around her body, creating a protective shield that Chell needed right now. Gordon removed a piece of his orange armor and tore at his exposed shirt; tearing a piece off that he immediately pressed against the wound. Chell felt her legs give way underneath her, but Gordon gently lowered her to the ground. Chell could feel her body reacting to the immense pain radiating from her stomach, and soon she began to go numb. "I… I can't feel anything!" Chell uttered through her teeth.

Gordon shifted his position so that Chell's head was resting on his legs. He reached into a pocket at the side of his suit and pulled out a little red capsule. Gordon took the lid off the capsule, exposing a sort, tiny needle. He pressed it into Chell's arm, and pushed down on the top of the capsule, transferring the red liquid into Chell's body. "What is that?" Chell asked.

"A solution that I always carry around with me, just in case. It will stop the internal bleeding and help your body repair itself." Gordon replied as he pulled out the needle and packaged it back up into his pocket. Gordon turned to smile at Chell. "We'll have to get that bullet out, though. The sooner we do the better."

Chell looked down at her bloody stomach and sighed. She then glanced over to Alyx who was standing a few feet away, looking shocked and sorry. "Why?" Chell asked.

Alyx blinked and opened her mouth to respond, but Gordon cut her off. "Be quiet now, Chell. The sleep agent in the liquid I gave you should kick in any moment now."

-Gordon-

Chell nodded and looked up at Gordon. "I love you dad."

"DAD?!" Alyx exclaimed from behind Gordon. "You… and… WHAT?" She ecstatically yelled, pointing from Gordon to Chell. Gordon sighed. He would have to explain everything to Alyx, unfortunately. Every last detail. It would probably ruin his relationship with the doctors back at the base, but who gave a crap. Gordon looked into Chell's eyes as they slowly closed from the sleeping agent. She tried to mouth something, but Gordon tenderly put his finger on her lips; shushing her. Chell drifted off to sleep, and Gordon released her head from his grasp, gently placing it on the ground. Gordon got up off of the ground and swirled around to Alyx, who put up her arms in surrender. "Well? Why did you shoot her?"

Alyx started to tremble as Gordon stalked closer to her and grabbed her arms; yanking them down. "Why." Gordon repeated.

"Magnusson! It was Magnusson!" Alyx cried.

Gordon's face became puzzled. "What about Magnusson?"

Alyx looked away from Gordon and buried her face in her hands. "He told me…" She said. "… to kill her… and… and then you! I tried to kill her and I would have shot her in the head, but I knew that you had some sort of affection towards her. And I just couldn't ever kill you." Alyx turned back towards Gordon. "I didn't know… know that you were her father!"

Gordon took a step back and clenched his fists. Alyx trembled again. "Please! Don't hurt me!"

Gordon sighed and reached out to take her hand. "It's all right, Alyx. I won't hurt you." Gordon dropped her hand. "Magnusson, on the other hand…"

Alyx's eyes widened for a moment and she shuddered. "Gordon! What about Kleiner! He could be in danger!"

Gordon whipped his head over to Chell's sleeping body, and then back to Alyx's face. "I need to get back there. Can you take care of Chell while I am gone?"

Alyx looked shocked. "Really? You actually trust me with her?"

Gordon nodded. "I have trusted you with my life before. I trust her life with you."

Alyx smiled. "Thanks. Go and kill Magnusson for me."


	6. Chapter 6

_Author's Note:_

_Sorry for the lack in chapter updates. I have been really busy for the last few weeks, but now I have an overwhelming amount of time that I am devoting to writing. There are a few projects that I am working on with a couple other people that I am very excited about, but I'll talk about that when the time comes. Hope you enjoy Chapter 6!_

-Chell's POV-

Chell awoke with a start and sucked in a deep breath; sitting up abruptly. Her eyes came into focus, giving the blurry shapes before her structure and edges. The terrain around her came flooding into her vision, making her swivel her head this way and that to look around at it all. A splitting pain emanating from her stomach also became more acute and Chell groaned as she slumped to the ground once again. She closed her eyes and scrunched up her face on account of the pain. Chell heard footsteps off to her left and snapped her eyes and head in that direction.

Alyx stepped out of a small clearing of dense trees and bushes, brushing little pebbles of dirt off of herself with a fern leaf. When Chell saw her she let out a startled exclamation, which brought Alyx's attention to her face looking at her. Alyx smiled and waved, dropping the fern leaf to walk towards Chell. Chell tried to move herself away from Alyx, but cringed at the explosion of pain in her abdomen. Alyx's smile faded and she rushed to Chell's side, gently placing a hand over the area where the pain was coming from. "How's the pain?" She asked.

Chell didn't answer but just glared at Alyx, making Alyx sigh and sit back from a kneeling position. "Look. I'm sorry." Alyx said. "I'm sorry I shot you. I… I was just… just following orders… I guess."

Chell still looked at her with a hard unchanging frown. Alyx noticed. "Be mad all you want, but know that your Dad is off going to kill the guy that forced me to shoot you, and he tasked me with taking care of you while you heal."

Chell's face opened in surprise when Alyx said the part about Gordon being gone, but mashed it back into a hard expression. Alyx sighed placing her hands on the ground behind her, looking wearily at Chell. "Listen. I've been through Hell and back with your dad. I've saved the world with him. I trust him more than anything. I promised him that I would protect you. Do you think I would break that promise?"

Chell shrugged her shoulders. "I've been a human lab rat being lied to and tricked by an AI that happens to be the robotic reincarnation of the science lab's founder for the better part of my adult life. The dream of going outside has been flaunted in my face for just as long, this being the first day that I have actually seen the direct light of the Sun ever since I was little. So yes, I do think you will break that promise."

Alyx looked shocked as Chell told her this, and let her jaw drop a few inches before recoiling it back up to a firm line. Chell looked back at her stomach and winced. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to tell you that. What's done is done." Chell sighed. "I still don't know why you shot me, but I forgive you."

Alyx nodded. "Thank you. I'm sorry you had to go through that."

Chell nodded her acceptance, and smiled weakly.

At that moment, a large boom rang out over the quiet valley and shook the ground around them. Alyx looked up at the sky and gasped. Chell looked up towards the sky as well, trying to find what had made the noise. She didn't have any time to gaze at what she saw because Alyx grabbed her hand and hurriedly lifted her up, making Chell scream out in pain. Alyx huffed an apology. "I'm sorry, Chell. I know you're in pain, but we need to move." Alyx looked into Chell's eyes. "If we don't get away from here, we'll be in a lot more pain than you are in right now… they're back."

-Gordon's POV-

Gordon pushed aside the thick foliage that encased him, peering into the ruined town before him. The walls of the town had long since been pulverized by the Combine after the citizens had uselessly tried to resist. The Combine had made short work of the buildings inside the city, but had left one standing to become an outpost for their soldiers. This building stood in the middle of the crumbling city square, and looked out at the city. It had several windows carved into its walls; all covered by some form of drapery.

Gordon remembered earlier yesterday when he had been inside that very building, peaking out at the jungle where he now hid in. Why had he trusted Magnusson? They both had known who exactly Chell was and what she could potentially have brought out of Aperture Science with her. Why had Gordon thought that Magnusson would not become greedy and selfish, thinking that he was the lord of everything? Gordon didn't know.

A branch sprung out of Gordon's grasp, slashing across his face and startling him. Gordon chuckled and replaced the leafy branch to his hands. Gordon once again looked in towards the city, gazing at the building before him. Gordon knew that there was only one way into the building that would ensure that he was not caught. This entrance was relatively unknown about and snaked in from the jungle to the very base of the facility; exiting into a storage locker of all places. Gordon knew that Magnusson would have already found out about Alyx's failure to dispatch of Chell, and so he would have placed a guard around him and to look out for me.

Gordon thoughts suddenly wrapped around Chell, and he sighed longingly. He wanted so badly to be with her at this moment. He wanted to be able to comfort her and tell her that everything would be alright. Gordon looked at the ground and shook his head. The first time he saw his only daughter in years and she got shot within the first few moments. Figures.

Gordon shook the thoughts of her out of his head and focused on the task at hand. Gordon stood up from the crouched position that he was in and walked over to the edge of the jungle, using his eyes and hands to search through and push away the foliage. He finally found what he was looking for: a rundown wooden trap door that was so obviously in disrepair on account of the lack of use. Gordon pulled away some of its rotting wood planks to reveal a watery concrete passage that darkened quite quickly as it traveled sharply into the ground. Gordon sighed again. Why had Magnusson decided to do this?

Gordon stepped into the passage and replaced some of the boards behind him, allowing some to go unreplaced so that some of the sunlight would trickle in behind him. Gordon traveled forwards down the tunnel, using his gloved hands to feel the sides of the concrete tunnel so that they would steady and balance him. After a few minutes of traveling, he started to hear muffled voices trickle down the tube to him. Gordon slinked forwards, straining to hear the words being spoken. They sounded familiar, and Gordon was quickly able to deduce that the voices belonged to two different people; both familiar.

Gordon recognized one of them immediately as Magnusson's own booming caliber of speaking, but the other he still was in the dark of why it was so familiar to him. Gordon continued to the walk down the tube as the voices cleared and became closer.

Gordon froze. He recognized the second voice. It was so distinctive. It was so chilling. It was something that he had been sure that he would never hear again. They were back.


End file.
